No cutesy intro ... BAM!
Blog.
Coming at you.
About 50 weekends ago I had the pleasure of visiting one of my teacher friends, his home, and his adorable little Korean family.
Moon teacher (as he asks me to call him ... because his Korean name is actually “Moon”) was one of my most favorite teachers last semester, but had to change schools in March, due to Korea’s making all public school teachers abandon ship (ship being their current school) every 3 years to find a new ship.
Well, actually the government finds them a new ship, they’re not like pirates or anything.
Anyways, last Saturday Moon invited me to his house, to meet his wife, and have lunch with the family. Moon has two sons, one of which is a first grade student of mine, Benjamin (note: this is the English name he chose in my class, and how Moon now refers to him. Pretty sure his actual Korean name is “Star” or something). So Moon came and picked me up at 9:30 am (because every Korean deems there should be at least 4 hours of “hang-ee out” time before lunch).
He first took me to his new school ... the “Gwangju Technology and Electricity High School” - at least that is what Moon called it. And even though his English isn’t stellar, I’m going to guess he was at least partially correct, in that the sign with the school’s name on it outside was about a mile long.
After a pretty sweet tour of the outside (which definitely put Hwasun High School to shame and quite possibly Gwangju University because the school grounds were roughly the size of a small town) he invited me into the gym to “watch-ee and play” volleyball with the high school’s volleyball team.
Moon teacher knows that I enjoy playing volleyball, and also that I’m not absolutely terrible at it (due to my previously mentioned volleyball domination during teachers’ sports day), so he thought it would be best for me to come and watch his high school boy’s volleyball team practice on Saturday morning.
Side-note: Moon’s high school boys’ volleyball team is supposedly the “best in the nation” as he explained ... which I think could very much be true, after watching them practice for a couple of hours.
These dudes were tall. I’m aware that I’ve been in Asia for almost a year, and that my definition of “tall” is now somewhat skewed, but these dudes were legit tall. I’d give them 6-5 / 6-6. Probably the tallest dudes I’ve seen in Asia in the past 10 months. Not including Yao Ming and that one guy who holds the “tallest man in the world” record. (But I’ve only seen them on TV, and we all know that TV adds about 2 feet, so Moon’s volleyball boys are currently the “tallest dudes in Asia”.)
So Moon and I watched them practice for about 2 hours. And yes, it was awkward. For everyone.
“Hey guys. This is a white girl. She’s just going to sit over here in the corner and watch you hit balls around. It’s ok. She’s cool.”
And that’s what happened.
Moon really wanted to play with them ... God knows why, his volleyball skills are nothing to write home about, and the fact that he’s about 5-2 is cause for some concern ... but I wasn’t aware for his desire to ball, and thankfully wasn’t properly dressed.
After an exciting round of volleyball, Moon and I headed over to his house (or rather his 13th story apartment ... George Jefferson would be proud) to meet his adorable little family.
Moon introduced me to his wife, and we met up with his son Benjamin, who speaks really good English and is probably the most adorable thing ever.
So we did whatever anyone else would do on a Saturday afternoon, Moon’s wife made me strawberry juice and the family showed me the 7 (yeah, 7) photo albums full of pictures that they took during their European family vacation a couple years back.
For those of you who are lucky enough to be friends of mine on Facebook, or be able to see my Korean photos, rest assured that Moon’s picture-taking abilities far surpass my own.)
There was a picture of them in front of absolutely everything ... totally living up to the age old “I’m a Korean and I love to take pictures” stereotype.
“Hey ... here’s a rock ... let’s take a picture of it. And then with it. And then of it again, just incase it changed.”
“Oh look! It’s an escalator ... let’s take a picture of that too. And a picture of us standing on it. And maybe a picture of these white people standing on it, just for good measure.”
Among the many European pictures I viewed, I also saw a lovely portrait of a handsome older Korean man in a super fancy suit, hanging in their coat room. When I asked who the handsome man was Moon replied, “My dead father.”
If that wasn’t awkward enough, they then posed for what seemed like a moment / eternity of silence, in the coat room.
If you’re ever in Asia, I would recommend not inquiring about any pictures of old people, as it’s about 80% sure that they are in fact deceased.
(Also made that mistake with the host-family circa August 2009.)
So after we all got our coats from the coat / dead man room, we headed to VIPS, the classiest of Western buffet restaurants. And it was absolutely delicious.
Anytime there is a buffet of something other than octopus and/or kimchi, I’m game.
Moon and his family treated me to an excellent lunch and some pretty stellar conversation ... topics including, but not limited to: religion, bread, movies, and Roachdale, Indiana.
During our day of fun, Moon also talked me up about this “amazing, Rauren, amazing!” movie he recently saw ... “The Blind Side”. He said it was the best movie he’d ever seen, and probably the best movie in the history of movies.
Quite intrigued, I told Moon I would see the movie later that weekend, to his delight.
He then asked me to e-mail him with my critique of the movie, writing to him as I would a friend.
So I did.
Saw the movie, and while it was pretty inspirational, I thought it was kind of lame and in no way should have Sandra Bullock an Oscar. I thought her portrayal as Gracie Hart in “Miss Congeniality 2: Armed and Fabulous” was much more convincing.
I have yet to hear back from Moon. I hope the friendship isn’t over.
My oldest host-sister, Eun Lae, recently informed me that “like Rauren ... take the bus!” She explained that last week she drove the side of her car into a guardrail, the one that lines the bridge outside of the house. So her car is now at the “car doctor”.
Again, not helping the whole “Asian-women-aren’t-the-best-drivers” stereotype.
My host-brother, Sang Che, recently visited a tarot card reader, because that’s just something you do when you’re 25 and a boy.
I think he was just too lazy to actually attempt to plan his life, so he thought he’d check out a fortune teller and make her do the job for him.
But said fortune teller wasn’t much help, in that her only advice / prediction was that Sang Che was too fat and should exercise more.
This was all told to me by my host-mother, who is also on the “Sang Che is fat” band wagon, and thought this was absolutely hilarious. And she’s pretty happy because she now has a reason to call her son fat.
Burn.
Fortune teller: 1
Sang Che: 0
In all fairness, Sang Che is no where close to “fat”. Granted, he’s no Rain .. but he’s definitely not “fat”.
I seriously just made a Rain joke. I need to leave Korea.
However, Sang Che’s 2 extra pounds of body fat are not keeping the ladies away. He recently started dating one of the smallest Korean girls I’ve ever seen, and a couple weeks ago brought her home for all of us to check out.
She is incredibly nice and speaks a fair amount of English, so I got to talk to her for a bit. She does, however, look like she’s about 12 years old. She claims to be a university student studying German, (because that’s a solid major choice ... German majors are in super high demand ... and I, as a Religious Studies major, know a thing or two about choosing practical majors) and to be only a few months younger than Sang Che, but throughout the entire course of the evening I could not stop wondering when she’d have to head home to prepare for her 5th grade spelling test the next day.
I really liked her and thought she was super sweet, as did pretty much the rest of my host-family, although host-mom was a little peeved that Sang Che didn’t call and tell us that he was bringing her over.
They arrived around 8pm, unbeknownst to any of us. Host-mom was wearing her usual hammer pants and giant, stained-with-hairdye t-shirt ... so she was a little embarrassed. She also didn’t have time to cut up the nice fruit, and we were stuck drinking orange juice.
Oh the troubles in Korea.
Host-mom still talks about it to this day.
And as far as I know, Sang Che and his new girlfriend are still dating, even though I hardly ever see him now that he’s moved out of the house and into his bro-pad.
Get it, Sang Che.
My lunchbox has recently become something of extreme celebrity at Hwasun High School. Many a teacher and student are enthralled with the fact that I eat food that was not prepared by the 20 old ladies behind the school’s cafeteria counter.
I mean, it is pretty marvelous, but come on.
There is one teacher in particular who finds this pretty interesting and often moseys over to my lunch seat to see exactly what I’ve got going on in my box.
After checking out the usual sandwich, salad, and fruit (all while touching just about every piece of food I have) she sometimes decides that it’s just too much food for one foreign girl to eat, and uninvitingly noms on my food.
And she’s usually right ... host-mom packs an obnoxious amount of food in my daily lunchbox (in addition to cutesy flowers and other foliage she finds in and around our house), but I’m starting to get pretty annoyed with this one particular song-sang-neem.
Fulbright Orientation definitely didn’t cover this topic in July.
I’m thinking of applying to give a supplemental talk this summer to all the incoming ETAs ... something along the lines of “Hey. There’s this one annoying teacher who won’t stop touching my sandwich. What should I do?”
Earlier this month, Hwasun High School had their semi-annual mid-term exams.
This was awesome for me (I got an entire week off from school!), not so awesome for my students.
During my free week I didn’t do anything or go anywhere.
Recently at school I’ve made some new teacher friends.
This is exciting because my new teacher friends aren’t 50+ years old (like every other teacher at Hwasun High School) and are super cool (which is pretty much my only friend requirement).
Two university students have started student-teaching at school in the art and science department. They both speak a good amount of English and when we’re not busy making students learn American culture or practice their anime drawings (guess which one I do) we usually hang out in the teacher’s room and do the whole “let’s learn about each other’s culture” thing. They’re super interested in my American-ness and it’s really cool for me to be able to talk to someone at school who didn’t just become a grandmother for the 3rd time.
(That also happened to one of my fellow teachers last week ... along with her turning the big Korean 6-0 (60) ... so she celebrated by bringing in a cake for all of us and wearing an extremely short mini-skirt to school.)
Happy Birthday.
The scary important superintendent for the Jeollonando province came to visit my school this week. It was an insanely big deal (so says my co-teacher) because he’s pretty much the guy that decides if it’s worth actually giving us our paychecks. So Hwasun High School rolled out the red carpet (literally, they put a maroon-like carpet walkway down in the library) and treated the guy like he was Jesus himself.
I’m not exactly sure what he and all the higher-ups at school talked about, because for some strange reason I wasn’t invited to the meeting, but I did get to meet and talk with him for a while.
He walked around and observed all the English classes during the 3rd period (and thankfully I didn’t teach 3rd period that day, or otherwise he would have walked directly into my legit American slang lesson where I taught the kids what it is to be fo shizzle crunk, while making it rain in da club with their dudebros and shawtys). So instead, I was appointed to walk around with the superintendent and observe classes with him.
This was pretty interesting, because I had never before sat in on a Korean teacher’s English class, and this was a perfect time to do so because with the superintendent there all the teachers taught only in English.
So I sat, listened, nodded my head like I thought I should, and saw how drastically different their classes are from mine.
And the superintendent looked impressed, so I’m still banking (pun) on getting a paycheck this month.
Went to Seoul a couple of weekends ago.
That was fun.
A couple dudes in the Fulbright program have started / are starting their own band / 2-person guitar thing and actually got a gig (as the once popular Uncle Jesse would say) at a sweet bar in Seoul. And after digging on their tunes and jams (which consisted of actual legit covers) the crowd was also treated to a performance of what one rather loud lady called Korea’s “up and coming ... you should watch them ... they are good” rap groups, “One Way”. They are actually American born Koreans who have migrated to Seoul (not unlike myself, save the whole “born Korean” thing) and have a pretty solid following both here and in the states.
And after legally downloading some of their tracks (emphasis on the “legally”) I have to agree that they’re pretty decent.
So ... blog plug ... check them out, if you don’t want to go down the “wrong way”.
I’m sorry, this blog post is shaping up to be sub-par with the puns.
Now, I don’t want you all to think that my life is just lollipops and rainbows ... or slacking off and going to bars (I’m talking to you, Grandma) ... I actually do some pretty important work when in school / the classroom.
Exhibit A:
A couple weeks ago I taught my students what I have deemed probably the best lesson ever ... provided that you’re an English teacher in Korea, with students who are pretty low level and like to make sexy jokes.
And that is exactly my situation.
Korean kids love them a sexy joke. And when not phrased properly, the jokes are even funnier.
So after teaching my students all the “cool” and “hip” slang terms that every American teenager uses on a regular basis, I armed them with some markers, a blank comic strip, and had them go at it.
For those of you who aren’t totally aware of what is “cool” and “hip” in America these days, here’s a rundown of what I thought was worthwhile to teach my Korean students.
Note: The majority of the things that I teach are now chosen only for my entertainment. And to create a strong understanding of each other’s culture. Duh.
But who doesn’t love hearing 35 Korean students attempt to pronounce “baller”?
Ripped straight from my Power Point:
Fo Shizzle - an alternative way to answer “yes”, or “affirmative”.
“Hey. Do you like Obama’s new health care plan?”
“Fo shizzle.”
Baller - meaning “awesome” ... and when students still don’t understand quite exactly what “awesome” is, “something that is really good”.
“Do you like squirrels?”
“Yes. They are baller.”
Shawty - how you (if you = Jay-Z) refer to your girlfriend (who is most likely a bootylicious black lady)
“Jay-Z, do you have a girlfriend?”
“Yes. I have a shawty.”
Make it rain - a way to express spending large amounts of money (most likely on your shawty)
“That car is 40,000,000 won!”
“It’s ok. I will make it rain.”
Legit - a synonym for “good”
“Did you get a good grade on the test?”
“Yes. It was legit.”
Crunk - when one is intoxicated
“Hey. You are 21 and responsible. What are you doing tonight?”
“I am getting crunk with my friends.”
Woof - a reference to an extremely ugly person ... a la Buzz’s girlfriend ... “Home Alone”
“Is this boy attractive?”
“Woof.”
Get it - what one says when a friend is engaging in the fine art of flirting
(Because really, how could I come to Korea and not teach my students this?)
“Get it, Steve!”
Kicks - an alternative word for shoes
“Grab your kicks and lets go!”
Dude bro - an affectionate term for a dear friend
“Hey dude bro, want to play soccer today?”
What resulted was probably the best thing ever, no less great than if the Messiah himself decided to both take and participate in my conversational English class.
I was able to keep the comics and store them away in my “this is really awesome” file at school ... but I did take some pictures of my absolute favorite ones and uploaded them to Facebook. So check them out, friends.
I would post some here, but I’ve made it about 11 months so far without putting anything other than words out in the blog-world, so just check out my Facebook.
In addition to making my students super cool and spreading “get it” throughout Hwasun High School, I’ve also been letting them in on some other prized American culture in the form of song and dance. (That just sounds so much classier than, “I’ve shown them some music videos”.)
Students eat this stuff up.
What has been most popular is anything involving Lady Gaga (whom a good majority of the students think is either a man and/or transgender ... pretty sure that rumor started in Asia), Beyonce, and / or Justin Timberlake.
And I’m proud to say that after showing some classes Beyonce’s prized “Single Ladies” dance, it’s inspired them to learn part of her choreography and preform it at the annual Hwasun High School’s sports day, in front of the principal himself.
There is no greater joy than seeing your students dance to Beyonce in front of the super conservative, super intimidating school principal.
The scary important superintendent for the Jeollonando province came to visit my school this week. It was an insanely big deal (so says my co-teacher) because he’s pretty much the guy that decides if it’s worth actually giving us our paychecks. So Hwasun High School rolled out the red carpet (literally, they put a maroon-like carpet walkway down in the library) and treated the guy like he was Jesus himself.
I’m not exactly sure what he and all the higher-ups at school talked about, because for some strange reason I wasn’t invited to the meeting, but I did get to meet and talk with him for a while.
He walked around and observed all the English classes during the 3rd period (and thankfully I didn’t teach 3rd period that day, or otherwise he would have walked directly into my legit American slang lesson where I taught the kids what it is to be fo shizzle crunk, while making it rain in da club with their dudebros and shawtys). So instead, I was appointed to walk around with the superintendent and observe classes with him.
This was pretty interesting, because I had never before sat in on a Korean teacher’s English class, and this was a perfect time to do so because with the superintendent there all the teachers taught only in English.
So I sat, listened, nodded my head like I thought I should, and saw how drastically different their classes are from mine.
And the superintendent looked impressed, so I’m still banking (pun) on getting a paycheck this month.
I also had the great pleasure (pleasure being a stretch) of interviewing about 15 students who took part in an English competition.
Competition is also a stretch, in that it was basically some students who wrote an in-class essay about their favorite friend or trip ... which produced winning sentences like, “My best trip was Jeju, because airport suitcase machine is great.” ... or ... “My best friend is good because she is tall and handsome.”
So after the students wrote essays that would make the late Dr. King speechless / dreamless (pun) (does that even make sense?) they had to come talk to me for about 5 minutes about whatever I chose.
This meant that we talked mostly about their life’s ambitions, hopes, dreams, etc.
Or what their favorite boy band / anime show / hot Korean superstar is.
Last weekend I had the great honor to head down to Jeju for what looks to be the last time. (Insert strange Korean sad face here.)
It was about a million people’s birthdays, so some of the Jeju “crew” (the name given to them by God knows who) threw a birthday celebration for some of Fulbright’s most baller ETAs.
I won’t bore you with the long and tedious details of everything that was the Jeju birthday weekend ... because it was just that ... a snooze-fest.
False.
So I’ll bullet point you the high / low lights ... because there were definitely some of each.
The Jeju birthday bash was, but was not limited to:
Flight delay out of Gwangju - this sucked
Delicious macaroni and cheese - made with actual cheese (as much as processed cheese can pass as real cheese) instead of host-mom’s mayo
Super party-planning by Miss Ashley Pinney and Chelsey Taylor - feel special, only a select few earn blog-shout out status
Sweet tunes - both in the form of I-pod jamz and glorious Happy Birthday parodies (sung to the tune of the Eagle’s “Hotel California”) and a stellar Jeju Birthday mash-up
S’mores - “Oh hey there non-vegan Lauren, want a s’more?” Non-vegan Lauren: “mmhmp” (Too busy eating s’mores to talk.)
Extreme sleeping on super comfortable floor mats.
A day spent on one of Jeju’s finest beaches - I’m sure they’re all pretty fine, but seeing that it’s the first Jeju beach I’ve actually been to, and that I’ve now been to Jeju a total of 4 times, I thinking calling it anything than “fine” is just a tragedy.
Mexican food - pretty sure I gained at least 5 pounds this weekend. Happy Birthday.
Guy-liner made an appearance
Sexy hotel tunes - because who doesn’t love to clean the pool? Those UCLA ones are atrocious.
The Dome - actually happened, and that’s all I have to say about that.
Saw an elephant - that also actually happened.
More extreme sleeping on the floor.
Then an amazing 6 hour ferry ride back to the mainland - complete with more floor sleeping, farting old men, an ajumma giving me an entire bag of tomatoes, and getting ripped off during a taxi ride (which did not actually happen on the ferry, but worth mentioning)
And that was the Jeju birthday bash in a nutshell ... a very sparkly, lime-green nutshell.
And that was the past 50 million weeks ... I apologize again for not blogging in such a terribly long time.
But my grant year is almost over, and with that comes the un-welcomed frenzy of, “What are you going to do next year /slash/ the rest of your life? Because seriously, you have to do something.” And I blame my lack of blogging on just that.
If anyone has an idea of what that “something” is ... I’d be glad to hear it, because I’m getting a little annoyed doing the whole “chase your dreams” thing.
I’m too tired to be chasing my dreams. So I’m just going to ask them where they’re going and catch up with them later.
Totally can’t take credit for that great joke. Get it, Mr. Hedburg.
Until next time ...
(Which I promise won’t be in 50 million weeks.)
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